GENEALOGY AND HISTORY SITES THAT ARE FREE TO ACCESS AND FREE TO USE

Hard to find but free places where you can research genealogy on line, without having to pay. Your comments and feedback are welcome to any post. If you find dead links, please let me know so I can update or remove links that are no longer valid.

About me: Jerry E. ReedFirst and foremost, I am a seasoned voice talent and media/public relations specialist with many other interests. I have been helping businesses with their narrations, presentations, commercials, and more all of my adult life.For more information about Jerry Reed - Voice Talent visit:http://jerryreed.com

I am also a genealogist, an avid photographer, and artisan bread baker.My genealogy interest began before personal computers were a family "must have." Personal genealogy computer research has blossomed in the past 15 years. It wasn't long before someone decided that they could charge for information that should be free and in the public domain. I have always been frustrated by that. Now, thousands and thousands of pages of useful facts are coming on line daily in free-to-access digital archives located all over the world. So, I'm constantly searching for new sources of free on line material. Blog updates follow this section and all links are added to the master list below the new posts.Updates are posted whenI discover another new source or when something I have already reviewed gets a major update. Have fun and enjoy.

Note: if you find a link no longer works, please let me know so I can research and update it.

Thursday, February 5, 2009

I've been doing this blog now for about four months. Despite my efforts to promote it and attempts to get it listed in the search engines and other web sites, statistics indicate that the traffic is very low. If you like what I am doing and want this to continue, please leave me a comment. I love putting this together, but if no one is reading it, then there's no point in continuing.Talk to me...

19 comments:

I recently discovered your blog and have gone back and read all entries. I've added you to my Google Reader. Thanks for searching out new sites that I might not have discovered on my own. As another Upstate New Yorker, I encourage you to continue your efforts.

I recently discovered your blog and have it in my Google Reader. I hope that you keep it going. Have you joined the Genea-Bloggers Group on Facebook? It's a great way to get more readers to your blog and to connect with other bloggers.

I too am keeping an eye on your blog -- it is a widget on my protopage home page so it is possible that those views are not counted. I have mentioned it at least once on mine at midwesternmicrohistory.blogspot.com. My only helpful thought is that it probably takes more than four months for people to find out. Also, those of us who are basically pointing out research resources are reaching a smaller but hopefully more sophisticated audience. We're not going to be attracting those folks who decline to read genealogy journals because they "never see anything on their family," for instance. Give it a year at least! -- Harold

I've been researching my family's history for over two years, and have amassed quite a collection of websites of data. But I was pleased to see that most of the websites that you describe in your blog I had never heard of. So I hope you will continue to post!

Just a quick note to say that we’ve noted your blog over at Geneabloggers! It is now included on our blog list and I’ve also mentioned it in today’s post, This Week’s New Geneablogs (http://www.geneabloggers.com/this-weeks-new-geneablogs-4/).

I just recently discovered Genealogy Bloggs and recently created my first. I have been working on my tree for several years and while I have quite a bit of information I am stuck on my Greek Branch. If you our any of your viewers have information on how to locate ancestor's from Greece, please let me know. I have a set of Great-Grandparents who were born in Sparta, Greece and migrated to Quebec Canada. I have information for them and documents starting in Canada, but nothing else. I am looking for their parents.

Jerry,As a non-blogger, amateur genealogist and fellow "NY upstater", I find your blog most helpful and do have it in my google reader.

Another great free site that I didn't find in your list (my apologies if I overlooked it) is the Central Library of Rochester, NY. It has lots of great information such as plat maps for Rochester and other Monroe county towns, city directories, newspaper indexes and some early articles from local newspapers. The address is www.rochester.lib.ny.us.